On ochre, wild clay and foraging! This week I am joined by the magnetic pairing that is Heidi Gustafson and Belinda Blignaut. When I first came across the sculptures of the artist Belinda Blignaut I was blown away by them. Made from unprocessed clay and other found materials from her immediate surroundings, tapping into ideas around transformation. Though it took me a long time to actually reach out to Belinda and tell her what a fan I was, images of her works have been pasted on my studio wall and saved on Instagram for several years.
When we spoke on the phone a few weeks ago Belinda suggested we invite Heidi Gustafson to join us in conversation today.. And I’ve thoroughly enjoyed getting to know Heidi’s work in more detail since then.. Heidi is ‘a recovering philosopher who forages and crushes rock for a living.’ Her Book of Earth is an immersive introduction into the world of ochre, a naturally occurring mineral used to make pigment. Heidi’s cabin in the rural North Cascades shelters the Ochre Sanctuary project, which contains more than 600 pigments from around the planet.. a transforming body and future earthwork made with ochres and earth pigments gathered by humans worldwide.
We spoke about the body, and Belinda’s journey through health and healing. The body is central to Belinda’s work - the Mud Rights practice sees her covering her body with earth, creating an earth skin and lying down in the ground.. It is a still, meditative and contemplative experience of re-connection.
Heidi spoke about the vastly broad array of colours and forms that an ochre can take, how they have been a way of understanding her connection to earth, and how ochres are connected to our bodies through our material make-up.
Find Belinda & Heidi on Instagram: @belinda_blignaut @heidilynnheidilynn
Find out more about Heidi’s Ochre Sanctuary: https://earlyfutures.com/ochrearchive/
Heidi’s book, Book of Earth: https://earlyfutures.com/book-of-earth/
Belinda also organises the Wild Clay retreat: @wildclayretreat
We are on Instagram at @Mater________
We also have a website with 19 commissioned pieces of writing which can all be read for free on our website mater.digital
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